Carmen - Movie Reviews (2025)

Star Natascha McElhone is as beguiling as ever, though the tone of the film is very understated

Full Review | Feb 13, 2024

Carmen is a delight. There’s humour and sadness, all piled together into this memorable movie that speaks volumes of how a woman’s life.

Full Review | Sep 8, 2023

McElhone is a delight to watch, able to balance the poignant and comedic elements seamlessly. It's an uplifting celebration of a woman finally finding her voice.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Aug 24, 2023

Carmen is joyous. Despite its setting in a small Mediterranean town in the 1980s, the film feels like it’s a response to the lifestyle upheaval caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Full Review | Jul 24, 2023

Britell’s score soars, selling much of the deeply eccentric performance and visual style in lush, peculiar fever dream. Fine arts photography meets Malick meets stylized choreography: the world is a dance, we are all observers but we are all also dancers.

Full Review | Original Score: 9/10 | May 14, 2023

A picturesque ugly-duckling-to-swan tale...

Full Review | Feb 13, 2023

I choose to overlook its obvious flaws, as I was enjoying how the church was getting pay back for its past indulgences.

Full Review | Original Score: B- | Oct 5, 2022

Much like “Under the Tuscan Sun," “Eat Pray Love” and the 2013 Spanish language “Gloria,” it focuses on a reserved woman in middle age who discovers a previously untapped wellspring of confidence and brio who finally takes charge of her own destiny.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Oct 4, 2022

Buhagiar can't paper over all the screenplay's implausibilities and McElhone's performance probably deserved a richer movie. Still, Carmen, set in the 1980s, can be viewed as a pleasing tribute to a woman with fortitude enough to find a new life.

Full Review | Sep 30, 2022

Jubilant movie about a middle-aged woman who has spent her life serving the church and finds a new more fulfilling way forward.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Sep 29, 2022

Eat Pray Love (2010) meets Corpus Christi (2019) in this tender drama about a middle-aged woman reclaiming her life after years of service in the church.

Full Review | Sep 27, 2022

An engaging performance by Natascha McElhone in the title role makes CARMEN worth a look. Set in Malta in the 1980s, it’s the story of a repressed middle-aged woman who gets the opportunity to reinvent herself.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Sep 26, 2022

British actress Natascha McElhone shines alongside the sun-drenched Maltese scenery in this slight yet evocative tale of redemption and empowerment.

Full Review | Sep 23, 2022

Natascha McElhone is a wonder in writer-director Valerie Buhagiar’s charming dramedy “Carmen,” a film about a long-overlooked woman who finally comes out of her shell and puts a lifetime of silent observations to use.

Full Review | Sep 23, 2022

A playful crowd-pleasing tale of mid-life liberation, the Malta-set fable stars Natasha McElhone as a woman who rebels against the religious patriarchy.

Full Review | Original Score: B-plus | Sep 22, 2022

The film manages to be effective thanks to the breathtaking cinematography and a marvelous performance by Natascha McElhone in the title role.

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Sep 22, 2022

The final warm embrace of the people who had previously scorned Carmen wraps the film in a feel-good ending that rewards the viewer’s concern for her general welfare and erases the sting of the repressive and patriarchal customs.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Sep 22, 2022

In a movie where the central theme is a divorce from orthodoxy, the writer and director Valerie Buhagiar makes the wise decision to orient her film toward what’s pleasurable rather than what’s logical.

Full Review | Sep 22, 2022

Occasionally cheesy while lacking surprises and wit, but it's nonetheless s sweet, harmless and breezy coming-of-age story. The picturesque scenery and Natascha McElhone's warm, heartfelt and charismatic performance keep it afloat.

Full Review | Sep 19, 2022

Cute tale of a woman who becomes an amateur priest, with a Maltese Pigeon serving as symbol.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Sep 18, 2022